


The Valentine’s Misadventures of Roman Ogers

by Asoreleks



Series: Romanogers Valentine's Day 2017 [4]
Category: Captain America - All Media Types, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Action/Adventure, Awkward Steve, F/M, Hijinks & Shenanigans, Humor, One Shot, Romance, Shipping, Valentine's Day
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-18
Updated: 2017-02-18
Packaged: 2018-09-25 10:58:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,389
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9816851
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Asoreleks/pseuds/Asoreleks
Summary: A spaghetti-western style plot set after Civil War. Steve can’t ignore his feelings for Natasha and is determined to give himself a fighting chance for her affections. Just when he plucks up the courage to act, ridiculous hurdles present themselves.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I think I’ve watched too much soap opera television in my life. Oh well, hopefully all of that has paid off. Oh and there’s a lemon at the end of this ridiculously long one-shot.

 

**Disclaimer: I do not own any Marvel Characters or the Marvel Universes they interact in. I also do not own any recognisable popular culture iconography mentioned or described within the following story. I only own the plot of the story that I have written, but I do not receive any monetary reward for its distribution. I write for self-improvement in my writing skills and because I love the Romanogers fandom. All I get paid in return is smiles, laughs and sometimes tears over the lovely things readers write in their comments.**

 

The Valentine’s Misadventures of Roman Ogers 

 

Steve Rogers had never had a _real_ Valentine’s Day- at least in the sense that the day had never been particularly lucky or romantic for him. That sucked for a guy who was technically nearly a century old. It wasn’t as though there was a lack of interested parties, should he attempt to ask someone out. Even though Steve was still a fugitive from an astounding amount of governments around the world, he still had an army of fans declaring their willingness to be his significant other all over social media and fan websites. Steve supposed he should be grateful that random strangers found the idea of him attractive, and he was, but like most people he wanted someone to love and be loved by.

 

He wanted someone in particular- a physically and emotionally unavailable someone. Steve Rogers wanted Natasha Romanov. Steve Rogers was enamoured with Natasha Romanov. Steve Rogers desperately wanted the chance to be in love _with_ Natasha Romanov, if only he could capture her attention and impress her enough so that she might consider him as more than just ‘Steeb, the dweeb’.

 

Steve, in his ‘dweebiness’, had helped paint himself into the box marked ‘Not Natasha Romanov’s Type’ by going along with everybody else’s well-meant nudging to get himself a girl of his own. He’d gone and kissed someone else. Incidentally, the ‘Natasha Romanov’s Type’ box that Steve wanted to be in had certain membership requirements such as being in possession of brown hair, being terribly clever, being unintentionally destructive, being enigmatically misunderstood, and capable of major betrayal while under the influence of the factors that made one enigmatically misunderstood.

 

Steve had wondered for a while if repressing his emotions had led to them being manifested masochistically when he misunderstood, betrayed and sabotaged himself. He spent the year before the Lagos Incident confirming almost daily that he was definitely head over heels for his Second-In-Command, and he had been trying to drift closer to her at whatever pace she dictated. But then Lagos happened, and Peggy passed, and Vienna happened, and Bucky appeared, and Berlin happened, and then he was kissing Sharon Carter.

 

It was the third major ‘WHY?!’ of his love life after waking up from that prolonged refrigerated period in his life. The first was friend-zoning himself after the terrible Fugitive Kiss with a beautiful redhead. The second was not asking the redhead out for coffee like he wanted to even though they happened to be standing in a cemetery. The third was the regrettable Fugitive Kiss 2.0 with a new female lead, which the beautiful redhead knew about thanks to the astoundingly quick texting skills of his best friend Sam who felt the need to send the redhead a picture of the event on a Black Widow-distributed secure phone although they had been on the run due to major misunderstanding and destruction à cause de his other best friend who happened to be enigmatic and brown-haired.

 

The redhead replied with an ‘A- Okay’ emoji. What did that even mean? In Brazil the gesture was an insult. What did she mean?!

 

Being a political refugee with a limited variety in places to go and things to do provided Steve with ample time to think about his life. He swiftly came to the conclusion that he needed to fix things instead of keep at digging himself into emotionally agonising holes.

 

So Steve had a face-to-face conversation with Sharon Carter about how it wasn’t going to work between them, a conversation which Steve came away from in tears with Sharon providing him with comforting pats on his back. She said she knew what the outcome would be anyway. She was a trained espionage agent and she could read body language and she had studied him over the years. She could sense how tense he was when he kissed her and the tone of the gesture on his part felt like he was giving up. It was an ‘I might die’ kiss, not an ‘I’m so very into you’ kiss. But Sharon had gone along with the flow because she’d grown up on romanticised stories of Steve’s heroics and she’d spent years observing that he was ridiculously hot. It seemed like a good opportunity and she indulged herself. Sharon told Steve he was a catch, but that he was probably waiting for a shark and shouldn’t be jumping into her net.

 

Sharon said that if he had been truly interested then despite being a slow-coach on all things romantic, he’d have been clear about what he wanted. He’d asked her to coffee, but he was vague on the time and place. If Steve had wanted her, then he’d want definite answers. Steve was mortified that Sharon had managed to make more sense of the muddle in his gut than he had. He took mental notes and vowed to improve his tactics in his future dating endeavours. Steve had been so vague before it was no wonder he was in the friend-zone. He’d be clear with Natasha so she wouldn’t misunderstand that he was ambivalent. Because he was definitely not ambivalent about how he felt about Natasha Romanov.

 

Except the last time Steve had seen or heard from Natasha was months ago just after he had gotten Sam, Clint, Wanda and Scott out of the Raft Prison. She’d called to say she was going to ground because she had heard whispers that Secretary of State Ross was going to have her detained. It was the last time that he had heard her voice. Steve knew that she kept in contact with Clint and that she occasionally called Wanda, but other than general friendly messages passed along through those two he had not heard a peep from her. It sucked in the friend-zone, and it wasn’t the good kind of suck.

 

It was during one of her calls to Clint that Steve overheard some inspiring information. Steve hadn’t meant to eavesdrop, but Clint happened to be taking the call on the other side of the shrubbery that Steve was sitting next to during his break as he sketched the Wakandan landscape that surrounded the Royal Palace. T’Challa had offered them refuge and the gang gratefully accepted it. They all became contributors to Wakanda’s Local and Planetary Defence Intelligence Department.

 

“Nat, if you’re lonely… you know where we are. We miss you,” Clint told her with affectionate concern.

 

“I’ve got to do this first, Clint. I’m close. I owe it to him,” Natasha sighed on the other end of the line. Clint had put his phone on speaker and Steve’s stomach twisted in knots and delectable trills ran up his spine and scalp hearing Natasha’s voice for the first time in eight months.

 

“Well, at least you’ll be used to tropical conditions,” Clint chuckled. “It won’t be that big of a transition when you get here.”

 

“Tell me about it, I’ve been walking around with constant sweat patches under my arms. If I don’t lift my arms before nine in the morning then people don’t notice. But after that the sweat comes out of me like my underarms are a showerhead. I half want to devote my life to inventing an antiperspirant that’s kind to the environment and people’s pockets,” Natasha griped.

 

“I’ll invest and we could rival T’Challa’s fortune,” Clint quipped.

 

The pair chatted merrily for a few more minutes before wrapping up their call, during which time Steve had ample opportunity to muse over what he had learned. Natasha was in a tropical location. That meant she could be anywhere around the equator on three different continents and numerous islands. She had mentioned a ‘he’ she was obliged to help. A sinking feeling in his gut and a tightening around his throat accompanied the realisation that there was one ‘he’ that Natasha would go out of her way for and sacrifice herself to help. Natasha was looking for Bruce and she was close to finding him.

 

Panic slowly seeped into Steve’s muscles as he realised that his chance with the woman of his dreams was slipping through his fingers once again. He had wasted all the opportunities he had had while Bruce was off goodness knows where and Natasha was right there next to him. Steve didn’t want to experience the heartbreak of watching the person he loved loving and living fully with someone else. He really didn’t think he could endure that again, and he certainly couldn’t survive that happening with the same woman twice. Steve couldn’t deal with being ‘Not Natasha Romanov’s Type’ anymore.

 

The beginnings of a plan sparked in his mind and Steve abruptly stood and rushed off to see what resources he could gather to aide in his aim. He didn’t notice Clint poised in a tree with a smirk on his face tapping his phone against his chin as he watched Steve scurry towards the Palace.

 

The first place that Steve thought to go was the Communications Monitoring Division. He had an ally there, one that would go above and beyond to help Steve fulfil his mission. Azinande Mtwu was an analyst in the Communications Monitoring Division and had been one of the first work friends that Steve had made. They’d struck up a conversation when Steve had walked into the break room a few weeks into his asylum in Wakanda and found a solitary Azinande eating a salad out of her lunchbox. The lunchbox was shaped like a ship. It had custom decals of Steve’s and Natasha’s faces on it surrounded by hearts and roses. Azinande had blushingly explained that she ‘shipped’ them. Steve had replied with a shy smile that he ‘shipped’ them too.

 

Azinande had confessed to Steve that she worried that she would come across as a crazy fan, but Steve found that she was excellent company. She was witty and had such a broad general knowledge and insightful humorous view of the world that he was always entertained in her company. He knew that Natasha would like her as well. Azinande was a spitfire with a sharp tongue.

 

“Hi Steve,” Azinande greeted. She had an afro tinted navy that clumped together in peaks making her bright brown face look like it was encapsulated in midnight blue flames. Tortoise shell framed cat-eye glasses rested on the edge of her nose and they reflected the glare off of her hologram screen. Azinande had noticed him approach her desk from the corner of her eye and waved absently as she continued to type at her station. “What’s up? Hold on…”

 

Azinande had expected some sort of verbal response, but when Steve had remained silent she slowly turned to observe him. Steve’s shoulders were stiff and his eyes had bugged out.

 

“Steve, breathe in and out slowly,” Azinande told him calmly. “We don’t want you to start hyperventilating and have to call out a medical team to attend you. Those emergency blankets they make you wear when you’re in shock rustle like chip packets and you’ll probably look like a giant Dorito wrapped up in one. Sam will take a photo of that and send it to everybody. Breathe Steve.”

 

“Breathing,” Steve assured her as he inhaled deeply. Steve exhaled and relaxed his shoulders. “I need some help. I need you to do a trace for me, please.”

 

“Is this something for the items on our Watch-list,” Azinande asked as she quickly pulled up the relevant intelligence files for issues of concern that Steve was involved with.

 

“No, this is personal,” Steve admitted. “And I need to trace a call taken on a team member’s phone.”

 

Azinande’s eyes widened and her head whipped around to face him. “Who? What is this?”

 

“Clint… I heard him talking to Nat,” Steve informed her.

 

“He talks to Nat a lot,” Azinande reminded Steve. “Although we pick up the calls we don’t closely monitor them because it’s a major rigmarole to get through the encryption and it’s a sign of respect our King prescribed. We could also endanger Nat on the off chance that someone manages to hack our system and finds out her location.”

 

“I know,” Steve groaned. “I just… She’s located Bruce and… I’m going to lose her and I have to try something, Azi. I can’t go down without a fight.”

 

“I want to say something about how love isn’t a competition, but you guys are my OTP and it still feels completely unnatural that Natasha and Dr Banner could have been an item,” Azinande replied monotonously. Steve had told her about how Natasha wasn’t interested in him but had a relationship with another member of the team. Azinande’s mouth had dropped open when he had revealed who and she was completely speechless for three minutes and spluttered incoherently for another five before she spent the rest of the day exclaiming ‘Why?!’ at odd and inappropriate times. 

 

“Fine, I’ll do a trace,” Azinande muttered. “When was the call ended?”

 

“Eight minutes ago,” Steve supplied. Azinande quickly worked her magic and after a few minutes a red beacon flashed over the South American continent on the map of the globe that Azinande had brought up on screen.

 

“Looks like you’re headed to Bolivia,” Azinande concluded. She turned to grin at him. “Y’know, we could get you there before Valentine’s Day. It’d be so cheesily romantic if you confessed your feelings to her then.”

 

@>-`-,----

 

Azinande had been a great help in preparing Steve for his trip to Bolivia. She’d scoured surveillance footage and managed to find data whose subject matched Natasha’s vital statics. It was taken outside a pharmacy, and the woman was blonde and her face was not visible or reflected off of any nearby surfaces, but there was no mistaking that form. Natasha Romanov was in small town Bolivia.

 

Azinande coached Steve on his excuse for leave that he tried to present to T’Challa. T’Challa merely raised a brow knowingly and remarked that it had taken Steve long enough. Steve wanted to grumble about it, but it was true.

 

Azinande and Steve then talked confession and romancing strategy, and she almost put in leave herself so that she could accompany him but Steve assured her that he would manage. Azinande agreed that it was best that she stayed behind because it was a creepy hindrance to sexy times to know that there was some stranger cheering on the guy who likes you and co-ordinating his grand romantic gesture from a hotel room somewhere nearby. The Wakandan communications analyst resolved herself to making do with repetitive reminders to Steve not to pitch up with yellow flowers in hand to present to Natasha.

 

At that point, Sam had caught wind of the whole affair. Steve was sorely tempted to bring him along as a wingman, but Azinande reasoned with him that it was a bad idea. Steve had to do this on his own because no woman was impressed when a guy had his best friend giggling and egging him on in the background. Travelling across the world on his own would heighten the romance of the gesture. Sam actually agreed, and promptly roped Wanda in to help with their plans.

 

Azinande, Sam, Wanda and Steve worked on a suitable disguise to infiltrate Bolivia undetected by international eyes. They’d given him jet black locks which were gelled and combed into a ‘bad guy’ hair do- not ‘nineties Wall Street criminal’ slicked back, but ‘dubious vampire businessman who could head a cartel’. The style was also popular with Spanish speaking pop crooners. A spray-tan (so Steve’s new stark hair colour did not make him look undead) and a snazzy suit later and Steve looked like a flashy playboy ready for any kind of fun. It was exactly the opposite of his Captain America persona and Steve Rogers himself. Most people wouldn’t associate the image he presented with his identity. Azinande even booked him into the nicest hotel in town and reserved a sports car for him to hire.

 

Steve suspected his friends had a little too much fun with creating his cover when Azinande and Wanda squealed that he looked like telenovela star when they had finished. Wakanda was currently in the grip of a Latin telenovela craze and their team had been swept up into it. Wanda and Sam kept track of seven different shows and Steve wondered when they had time to watch all of that television. Sam replied that if he was still forced to wake up early to work out, then he was obliged to make it interesting by watching his shows on his phone. The statement had explained why Sam had managed to jog straight into the pool, stumble over a leopard cub and jog straight into the line of fire during Lila and Cooper Barton’s archery practice with their father over the past couple of months.

 

Soon their planning was complete and Steve was on his way to Bolivia. It was during the solitude of his flight to that country that Steve began to worry. Bolivia had an extradition treaty with the USA, but they had chosen to ignore that fact in the past. If the Bolivian agenda was different to the US agenda then Natasha might get some reprieve from the hunt. But the stories of the CIA making people disappear in jungles began to plague his thoughts. Sharon had worked for the CIA and Steve wondered if someone like her would be sent after Natasha. Steve also knew that Natasha had been the kind of agent sent by her previous employers to make people disappear in jungles. And then he began to imagine that Sharon had been sent after Natasha and the mental pictures he conjured up of the two badass agents tearing at each other were unsettling.

 

Steve knew he was riling himself up unnecessarily but he couldn’t help thinking about Natasha and Sharon viciously attacking each other in a fight to the death deep in the Amazon Jungle. There’d be kicks and punches to vital organs, their muddied bodies would wrap around each other writhing to strangle their opponent, clothes would tear as their hands would claw for purchase on curves and… suddenly Steve was picturing a redhead and a blonde sexy-fighting. He physically slapped his own face, mentally chastised himself for the ridiculous fantasy and diverted his overactive imagination to reciting baseball statistics for the entire history of the Dodgers team. It was a long flight.

 

@>-`-,----

 

The flashy disguise helped. No one looked at Steve to truly observe him. The only kind of reaction he got was either an eye roll over the obnoxiousness of his cover’s existence or the appreciative ogling of opportunists. Steve had to fight the urge to button up his half-open white shirt to the collar and roll down his sleeves to hide his sculpted forearms. The garment was a little too tight and showed off his musculature. The navy blue dress pants he wore were so fitted it would be immediately obvious if he found himself minutely aroused. The large gold watch on his wrist and chunky gold chain around his neck were probably worth enough to feed twenty villages for a year. A raven-haired woman outside the airport had actually toppled over into a bin when she walked into it as she crossed paths with Steve and continued to watch him as he headed off to collect his rented car. Steve wanted to check on her so bad, but it wasn’t part of his cover. Thankfully the only injury the woman had suffered was to her pride.

 

The drive to the hotel was smooth and uneventful. Steve used the built-in GPS of the car to make his way to the boutique eco-hotel located on the outskirts of the Bolivian Pampas, the pre-Amazonian wetlands on the edge of the forest. But soon an anticipated difficulty arose: Steve would have to speak to the hotel staff and check in. Steve’s Spanish was excellent and Natasha had coached him on various regional accents. He had chosen to use a Colombian accent and his execution was flawless. But Steve had a problem with his cover name.

 

Years ago, the Avengers had spent an afternoon off listening to Tony gripe about tabloids. Tony had been incensed at the pitiful couple’s name that the tabloids had come up with for him and Pepper. ‘Topper’ sounded too much like a cheap British biscuit brand or a porno term to him. That led to them discussing potential couple’s names the media might come up with during their incessant obsession with investigating imaginary romantic connections between the Avengers. ‘Romanogers’ was the name preferred for Natasha and Steve as a couple. When Steve met Azinande he found out that it had actually become a real term for the people shipping him and Natasha. Azinande was full-swing into her cheesiness wave when she was building an identity for Steve and gave him the pseudonym ‘Roman Ogers’. Steve did not know how he was going to introduce himself using that name with a straight face to the concierge.   

 

“Your name, señor?” the nice man behind the counter asked in Spanish when the time came. The copper-skinned concierge smiled warmly at Steve as he waited to search for Steve’s booking on the computer system.

 

“Ogers- Roman Ogers,” Steve answered. He groaned inwardly at how he had managed to make the inflection in his answer sound like he was trying to make a lame James Bond joke. The concierge was too well-trained to reveal any opinion on Steve’s response.

 

“We have you in the Serpent’s Celestial Suite on the third floor, Señor Ogers,” the concierge beamed at Steve as he quickly completed checking Steve in. It felt weird to Steve to be referred to by a name that was missing just one letter from his real surname. Steve thought he might have read somewhere that the name Ogers was related somehow to the surname Rogers. Listening to the concierge roll his ‘R’s, it sounded as though he had called him ‘Señor Rogers’ anyway.

 

“Ecidro will show you to your room, señor. Please enjoy your stay,” the concierge told Steve as gestured to an elderly porter behind Steve. Steve was racked with guilt as Ecidro took control of Steve’s bags and pleasantly chatted with him as they made their way through the lobby to the lifts. The man looked like he was approaching sixty and had a wiry build, but showed no signs of fatigue as he hoisted Steve’s suitcase and hand luggage. It took just about everything Steve had to continue to commit to his role and let the elderly Ecidro continue to push his luggage along on his trolley. He decided to keep his mind off his guilt for not making use of his super-soldier strength and sparing a near senior citizen a potential back injury by engaging the man in conversation to see whether he could find any local leads on Natasha.   

 

“Are you here on business or pleasure, señor?” Ecidro enquired keenly.

 

“Neither, but maybe the latter later,” Steve answered in Spanish, “if I’m lucky in my pursuits.”

 

“Well, a strapping young man such as yourself would likely experience no trouble catching the attention of the ladies,” Ecidro grinned as he pushed the trolley into the elevator behind Steve.

 

“I’m actually looking for someone- a special someone,” Steve admitted with practiced care. “My girl. We had a fight and she came here to get away from my idiot self. It took me a little too long to find out where she went, but now I need to be where she is to show her how I feel about her.”

 

“When you’re young and in love, these things happen,” Ecidro chuckled. “I once ran after a bus my wife was on for five kilometres- stumbling over the rocks and pebbles of the dirt road- while she yelled at the driver not to stop back when we were still dating.”

 

“I miss her,” Steve sighed truthfully as the elevator doors opened on his floor. He straightened up suddenly and spun around to face Ecidro. “What if she were in this same hotel? You see a lot of the guests, right, Ecidro? Let me show you a photo.”

 

“I’m not really allowed to do anything like that, Señor Ogers,” Ecidro hesitated as Steve whipped out his phone to show the grey-haired man a doctored photo of Natasha as a blonde. It was a silly selfie that Natasha had taken while they were testing out the camera on his new phone ages ago. Natasha stuck her tongue out through a pout while Steve made a monster face in the background. It was cute and could pass for a genuine couple’s picture. Azinande had selected it among a load of other believable shots and photoshopped the lot to match the pair’s current colouring. Steve scrolled through several photos but Ecidro avoided looking at them.

 

“Please, Ecidro,” Steve beseeched as they entered his suite. It was decorated in shades of green, had a huge skylight and a snake motif. “I’ve got a ring burning a hole in my pocket and tomorrow is Saint Valentine’s Day.” The ring bit was a complete lie but Steve was determined to do everything he needed to just to get in front of Natasha and ask her for a chance. Happiness with another person was hard to find in a world with seven billion people in it. You had to sort through more people to find your ‘one’.  

 

Ecidro grumbled good-naturedly and relented. He took a look at the phone’s screen.

 

“I haven’t seen anyone who looks like her at the hotel,” Ecidro told Steve, “but I think I may have seen a woman like her yesterday or so. My wife, Cecelia, works for a tour company and I remember a blonde asking about a Pampas boat tour when I went to pick her up after my shift. You see more wildlife in the wetlands. I remember a woman blonde like this, but she was wearing sunglasses.”

 

“Thank you, Ecidro,” Steve gushed. “You’ve helped me so much!” Steve shook the man’s hand, slipping a generous tip to Ecidro in the gesture. Ecidro was surprised and Steve had to insist that the man take it to spoil his wife. Steve quickly freshened up and set about continuing his search. 

 

From that point on it was easy to track Natasha. Even though she was trained to blend in, she was rather memorable. Steve found out that she had taken a boat cruise of the wetlands that was supposed to anchor in the late afternoon before dinner and then the tour would continue with a short nocturnal safari hike in the jungle with a slightly larger group. Steve was going to make sure he was in that group.

 

Steve wondered how this could possibly factor into a plan to find the man who’d captured Natasha’s attention first. He doubted that Natasha would need to go on a group hike to find Bruce. If he was hiding in the jungle then surely she would go to him directly. But perhaps she didn’t want to draw attention to herself by asking to hire gear as a beautiful single woman heading out into the jungle on her own. Or perhaps she was gathering her courage to face Bruce- who was likely providing free medical services to a rural village- after all this time. They had complex issues between them, but Steve knew how dedicated she must have been to the man to search him out, to have let him into her heart in the first place. Steve’s spirits sank for a moment as he contemplated how he fell short in comparison to Bruce in so many ways.

 

He got onto a boat that followed the same route and would end up at the dinner spot where the nocturnal walk participants would gather. Steve mused that if he really had a ring in his pocket, the picturesque natural beauty of the surrounding environment would make for a beautiful backdrop to the act. It wasn’t part of his cover, but Steve couldn’t help but pull out an A6 artist’s notebook and quick sketch a few of the animals they spotted on their journey while the other tourists took photographs with their huge SLR cameras and their phones.   

 

“Oh my word,” a guy seated in front of Steve commented with an eager snicker as they approached the thickness of the jungle verdure, “It’s like we’re in that movie ‘Anaconda’. What if there’s some huge-ass snake out there waiting to bite our heads off?”

 

His friend, who was fiddling with his backpack, replied dryly: “We just saw an anaconda swimming in the river. They’re big, but not that huge. Animals can’t get that big anymore- like dinosaur-big- because of the oxygen levels in the atmosphere or something. Also, snakes swallow you whole. They don’t do things like bite your head off.”

 

Natasha had explained the same thing to Steve ages ago when they watched the old horror movie and she had told him about the legends that inspired the script. They didn’t see any huge anacondas, but they did see two pink river dolphins frolicking in the murky water.

 

Steve arrived at the dinner spot and immediately set about asking the people nearby if they had seen his girlfriend and showed them pictures of Natasha. Steve was quick to introduce himself as ‘Roman’ and concentrated on perpetuating the personable air that his cover was meant to have. It seemed that being bubbly got results. He gleaned from his enquiries that Natasha was wearing a white t-shirt, which matched what he had changed into at the hotel. Steve worried irrationally about how rain was guaranteed at that time of year in the Amazon and how white fabric turned see-through. Steve stamped down the flare of protective concern for Natasha who was among strangers and clenched his teeth in a tight grin whenever the people he questioned went on about how attractive Natasha was, which was often.

 

Steve then found out from the staff that she had arrived, but that she’d left on the afternoon hike. He was tempted to march straight into the jungle as soon as he had heard, but that would have seemed insane in front of all the people he had just talked to in his guise. Steve settled for disappearing into the darkness when the walk started. Steve knew that it was a really stupid idea, but he had to at least search the area for a hidden house that Bruce may be holed up in. Steve’s stomach churned visualising the possibility of witnessing a physical reunion between Bruce and Natasha through a window and he suddenly found his ears ringing in response to the thought that he might hear their reunion before he saw it thanks to his damned super-soldier serum-enhanced senses.

 

The sun set and their guide gathered the group of tourists to begin their walk in the jungle. Steve blended in with the group as much as he could, and slowly edged back in their travelling order on the trail, letting others pass him by every now and then until he was at the end of the group. He stopped to tie his shoe laces while the guide pointed out some wildlife in the canopy and took the opportunity to silently dart into the bushes.

 

Steve was grateful for his jungle tracking and survival training refresher course that T’Challa had provided the exiled Avengers with back in Wakanda. It was a completely different forest on the other side of the world, but the basic principles on how to get on with things were the same. In a short amount of time, Steve had found an abandoned mini-backpack. It was new and looked to have been dropped as recently as two hours prior to his discovery of it. The contents held a brochure from the tour and scarf, which held Natasha’s scent. He felt a bit like a creep sniffing at the scarf like a bloodhound, but Steve had enhanced senses and an eidetic memory. He’d know Natasha’s scent profile anywhere. Also, he found her pheromones a smidge addictive.

 

Her water bottle was missing, but there were signs of two people’s footsteps in the trampled leaves and mud. One set belonged to a woman about Natasha’s size, and the other belonged to a much larger person who carried a lot of weight. There were also broken twigs and gouges in the mud indicating signs of a struggle. Natasha’s footprints disappeared and the large person’s continued for a few feet south west before disappearing as well.

 

Steve felt the cold clutches of panic creep up his spine and take hold of his heart. Natasha was in trouble. Something bad had happened between her and the larger assailant and she had probably been knocked out or tied up and carried away. The assailant could have moved up into the trees and moved through the canopy. Steve had to rescue her before something horrible happened.

 

The consequences of growing up in a time when motion pictures were a larger than life treat that impressed their contents onto the minds of their impressionable viewers made themselves known at that moment. Visions of an unconscious Natasha being dragged away by her own green King Kong flashed through his mind and Steve was overcome with guilt. No matter what he felt for Natasha, he knew he shouldn’t demonise Bruce like that. Bruce may have left Natasha and the team, he may have gained Natasha’s love and not realised how precious her affectionate regard was, but Bruce was still that soul who wanted to be gentle and who was incredibly understanding of those around him. He never alienated Steve.

 

Once Steve had set his train of thought back on the rational rail, he realised that the tracks of the larger person were not large enough to be the other guy. And there was no such thing as a half-transformation when it came to the Hulk- or at least Steve hoped there wasn’t. He really hoped there wasn’t. Steve mentally slapped himself again, slung the discarded backpack over his shoulder  and stood up to follow the trail of broken foliage that appeared every ten feet or so. Wondering about the uses of being able to control the degree of transformation into the Hulk were not beneficial to his quest. In fact, wondering whether women would generally find the ability to turn a little bit into the Hulk in the bedroom appealing was downright hampering to his ability to avoid low-hung branches.

 

Steve had to traverse over a few waterways and used the roots and logs that poked out of the water where he could to do that. He was thankful for his enhanced vision, for if he was just a regular person he probably would not have spotted all the caimans and anacondas gliding through the water that he did. He was reminded that he was in the middle of a _wild_ jungle however when a tapir suddenly ran across his path. He hadn’t heard the herbivorous mammal and started in surprise. Steve hadn’t had time to process that he’d been caught unawares when a black jaguar raced out of the bushes in pursuit of the tapir and the sound of the smaller creature being mauled to death filled the air a few seconds later. Steve hoped like hell that Natasha was at least safe from the creatures of the jungle wherever she was. 

 

An hour into his tracking and Steve caught the scent of campfire on the breeze. His senses sharpened to block out the cacophony of night time cries emitted by the unseen Amazonian creatures and as he strained he could just pick out the sound of human voices in the distance. Steve swiftly and silently weaved through the brush, and closed in on the source of the smell and sound.

 

At last he spotted the flicker of a campfire, and Steve slowed to stalk closer with more care. Shadows moved slowly in the light of the fire and Steve counted four people awake and about. There were three tents and there could have been more people within them or nearby. The sounds of the dialogue drifting over from the encampment sounded like a Latin derivative language and Steve assumed it was Spanish. Steve decided to gather more intelligence about the camp and crouched down to where he could see but would remain camouflaged in the darkness and greenery.

 

Two of the campers appeared worried. One was a pale man and the other was an Asian woman. They seemed to be waiting for something and kept stretching up to peer off past their tents and away from where Steve was hidden. A third person, a mahogany brown man, was staring into the flames of the small fire. The fourth, another man with tanned skin and shoulder length hair tied into a ponytail, stood near the entrance of the nearest tent rubbing the back of his neck and watched the man tending the fire. The ponytail man looked exhausted. Steve noted that they all carried firearms: either rifles or pistols; and they all had blades on them. Steve turned his attention to the tents and tried to suss out which tent held Natasha if she was indeed within the camp.

 

“Hi,” a cheery voice greeted right next to him in English. Steve was too into the super-soldier zone to jump in surprise and only snapped his head to the side to face the owner of the voice. It was grey-haired waifish woman in khaki-coloured bohemian clothes and who had a rifle slung over her back. She grinned at him in a friendly manner. “Want to come into camp? We’ve got jaguars out here and they are designed to sneak up on ya.”

 

“Sure,” Steve agreed. He straightened up and mentally kicked himself for being made by someone who was wearing bi-focals. He assumed it was the glaring expanse of his white t-shirt that must have stood out in the tangle of flora. The grey-haired woman cocked her head to the side and tugged at the end of the long braid that fell over her shoulders as she appraised Steve for a few seconds. She nodded to herself and gestured for him to accompany her as she headed towards the firelight. She might have had a gun, but Steve was hesitant about taking down a little old lady who looked like he could blow her away with a sneeze. It would cause unnecessary commotion anyway, and that would only lead to bullets flying and running around in the dark jungle without a clue as to where he was running and over what he was tramping.

 

“I found a guest,” the bespectacled grey-haired woman announced as they stepped into the clearing where the camp was situated. “Everybody, this is Mr-”

 

“Ogers,” Steve cut in. He winced internally before he continued: “Roman Ogers.”

 

“Well then this is awkward. We thought you were Steve Rogers,” a deep voice announced from the tent that the ponytailed man still stood next to. A large shadow moved within it, and a few seconds later a large, heavy set man with bronzed skin crawled out. He stood to reveal a height of six foot six, and Steve judged him to have the necessary weight to have made the second pair of footprints where Natasha’s had disappeared.

 

“What have you done with her?” Steve growled as he glared at the large black-haired man. The man frowned at him in what Steve concluded was confusion before the whole group burst out into laughter.

 

“I take it from your staid line ripped from just about every action movie, that you think we’ve hurt Natasha somehow,” the large man chuckled. “That couldn’t be further from the truth. I could never hurt the woman who saved my life.”

 

Steve remained wary as the people around him continued to chuckle quietly.

 

“I’m Benicio,” the man explained. “That’s Beatrice, right next to you. This is Oliver with the long hair. The guy at the fire is Chinua, and Zhiyi and Thomas are behind you.”

 

“We’re environmental activists,” Beatrice, the woman with the long grey braid, explained.

 

“We’re here to protect the forest from illegal loggers,” Benicio expounded. “We’ve had to resort to slightly more militant measures and asked Natasha for a little help. We weren’t expecting a second Avenger to pitch up.” Benicio stepped forward and held out his hand for Steve to shake. Steve took the man’s hand and was welcomed into the group.

 

“Where’s Nat now?” Steve enquired.

 

“Reconnaissance. We needed evidence of the logging company’s illegal acts and she volunteered to help us get it,” Beatrice enlightened him.

 

“I take it she went in solo as usual,” Steve sighed. He should have figured that Natasha would continue avenging even if the Avengers Team had kicked out the majority of its members and now only consisted of Tony, Vision, and that kid from Queens. This time she was avenging on behalf of the planet itself. If people didn’t stand up to protect the planet from a few people caught up in gluttonous schemes, then there’d probably be no life on the planet to protect –aside from amoeba things that needed no one’s help- within the next hundred years.

 

“She told us to wait and she would get enough for us to challenge them in court and win,” Oliver, the ponytailed man, told Steve. “Natasha said she’d rather we stayed out of the sights of those ruthless fiends.”

 

“Greed makes people blind and shrinks their hearts,” Beatrice remarked. “How else can you explain the atrocities people commit against each other and this planet all in the name of power that the construct called money can bring them? That power only exists because the rest of us consent to infuse that symbol with power.”

 

Steve and the environmental activists sat around the fire and discussed the criminal activities of the logging company and what they had been doing to try to thwart them. They all lived in fear of being assassinated for their activism, like so many defenders of the planet around the world. But if they allowed the shady logging companies to take advantage of loopholes in law, corrupt officials and thinly spread patrolling forces then the major jungles that kept Earth’s inhabitants breathing clean air would diminish to nothing.

 

Steve found out that Natasha had saved Benicio from an assassination attempt a few years ago. She’d been on a different mission and happened to come across Benicio as he was being kidnapped. Natasha defeated the thugs who had been hired by the logging companies that wanted to get rid of Benicio, and got them thrown into jail. During that debacle, Natasha had been nicked in a vital artery and Benicio, who was a GP, had stitched her up. Benicio knew that Natasha was now a fugitive from the law, but the group desperately needed her help as a logging company had been causing chaos with its deforestation efforts. They needed to get evidence of their activities to shut them down and have them charged before more of the Amazon was destroyed and countless animal and plant life snuffed out.

 

The abandoned backpack had been the result of a mishap. Unknown to most, Natasha had a phobia of frogs; and when she had taken off her backpack to get some water she had discovered five Poison Dart Frogs congregating happily on her bag. She freaked out and drew the attention of Benicio, who had been on his way to meet her at the coordinates they’d agreed on. Natasha had jumped on Benicio’s back and he had to carry her to camp. Steve was one of the few people who knew of Natasha’s aversion to the amphibians, and had witnessed her backflip onto a counter at the sight of one at the Barton farmhouse kitchen door. If their work ever led them to meet with a sentient species that resembled frogs, then Natasha was going to have an immensely difficult time.

 

Steve found that the group of activists were a pleasant bunch to talk to. But although their conversation was stimulating, Steve couldn’t help worrying about Natasha alone on her mission. He knew she could take out any human threats, and any humanoid threats. But there were jaguars, caimans and anacondas out there. There was quicksand. There were poisonous bugs. There were poisonous frogs.   

 

Dawn drew near, and Steve had to voice his concerns. Beatrice explained that the loggers were camped twenty kilometres away and that the terrain could be difficult to navigate. They did not expect Natasha back until that evening. That was too much for Steve’s nerves and he decided that he would follow Natasha- as back up if she happened to need any.

 

They all exclaimed it was terribly sweet of him to worry so adorably when his girlfriend was such a badass. Steve tried to clear up their misapprehension, but only managed to splutter as he stumbled out of camp in the direction that Natasha had headed to find the loggers. After twenty minutes of tramping through the forest, Steve realised that it may have been a good thing that the group was under the impression that he and Natasha were an item. Maybe it meant that other people thought they suited each other too- people who weren’t even actively on their ship.

 

As he travelled through the jungle in the morning light of Valentine’s Day, Steve became aware of the fact that he still hadn’t come up with what he would say to woo Natasha. The word ‘woo’ and Natasha in the same thought sort of sent cold shivers, akin to those he felt before panic attacks, down his spine. If Steve said anything that remotely sounded like he was there to be Natasha’s knight in shining armour, the woman would laugh at him and then get so mad she’d actually find a way to stick a Poison Dart Frog down his pants. Besides, he wasn’t there to rescue her (unless she needed a helping hand); he was there to get her to notice him. It was an awful way to phrase what his intentions were, and his words recalled many annoying memories of being friend-zoned while Sam popped out of nowhere and whispered in a high-pitched voice next to him ‘Notice me, Senpai!’ as Natasha walked off unawares yet again from an instance where he attempted to properly flirt with her, or ask her out. Pitching up in the middle of the Amazon should make it obvious what Steve felt for Natasha, but in case it wasn’t clear Steve was going to have to make a grand speech declaring his feelings. After which he could possibly crash and burn from rejection. Still, he had to try.

 

He would have to tell her how he felt, and why he felt that way and for how long he felt like that. He would also have to ask if she felt anything for him, and if she didn’t then he’d have to ask if she could possibly feel anything romantic for him after some consideration because perhaps she had never considered him in that light. And then he’d also have to assure her that although he hoped that she did reciprocate his feelings, or hoped that she could possibly reciprocate in the future, she wasn’t obliged to return his sentiments. And then there was also the whole Bruce landmine field. He’d have to apologise if his advances were deemed disrespectful; and if she was still with Bruce and in love with Bruce then pitching up half way across the world to confess to her was not a grand romantic gesture, but a grand callous gesture.

 

Steve was in a quagmire either way unless a flying unicorn flew down on a rainbow and sprinkled lucky fairy dust on him, or brought him a vial of _Felix Felicis_.

 

Neither seemed to be close to happening because Steve was so absorbed in his thoughts that he managed to stomp right off a cliff and down a waterfall. Thankfully the only things Steve suffered from that mishap was water up his nose, wet clothes and the loss of the dagger he had tucked into his boot. Also, he lost the protein bars he’d brought along as his emergency food supply. Steve reckoned that being unarmed and wet in an already humid jungle wasn’t as bad as it could get so he forged on.

 

Forty five minutes later and Steve missed his protein bars- a lot. He scolded himself for not eating one while he stewed and brooded over what to say to Natasha. If he’d done that, then he’d at least have been fuelled up. But he hadn’t and was left to wonder what the hell he could eat in the jungle.

 

Mammals and birds could be endangered rarities. Actually everything could be endangered rarities, but Steve was famished and he hadn’t eaten anything since the previous evening. That was a very long time ago in super-soldier digestive time. Sure he was built to withstand hunger for ages, but clambering through the jungle and falling over a waterfall tended to deplete one’s energy no matter whether one had been enhanced by a miracle serum or not. Steve had to eat something. Something made of protein.

 

Flashes of Discovery Channel programming lit up in Steve’s eidetic memory cache and the name Bear Grylls floated to the front of his mind. That guy ate lizards and snakes. Steve would have to find a lizard or something to eat. He knew he was fast enough to catch one. Dr Erskine had made sure of that. It was just… a lizard. Steve had to find and kill and eat a lizard. And his stupid super senses spotted fifteen lizards within range. Steve groaned and snatched out at a branch to grab a green-skinned reptilian. He got it in hand easily enough and it squirmed to get away.

 

“Blegh!” Steve griped before snatching the lizard to his mouth and biting its head off. He spat the small blob out and took another bite of the body. Belatedly, he hoped the creature wasn’t poisonous.  It certainly tasted horrible enough to be poisonous. Steve chewed and swallowed as fast as he could, finishing half the lizard before the taste appalled him enough to halt. He rolled up the hindquarters and tail of the lizard to keep aside in his pocket before he started off again. There had been a 0.001 percent chance that Natasha would feel the same way about him and possibly fall into his arms to engage in a deep passionate soul scorching kiss. Eating a lizard had probably obliterated those chances.

 

Steve returned to thinking about what he would say to Natasha when he finally met up with her again, but the taste of lizard in his mouth wouldn’t abate. He wondered if his breath smelled like dead lizard guts and how that would affect any communication he might attempt with the woman of his dreams. Steve decided that he should try to do something about his oral hygiene concerns, but toothpaste was obviously not an option. He’d had to use charcoal. That meant he’d probably be spitting out little globules of black for the next two hours, but it was better than the lingering lizard situation. Steve had to stop and find some dry fodder, which was difficult since it was the Amazon and it was the wet season in that region. He did have a tinderbox with him though, as he never left home base without one since he’d become the first Avenger.

 

Fifteen minutes later and Steve was squatting over a small pile of ash and rubbing charcoal over his teeth. It was as his index finger worked over the blackened rows in his mouth that Steve looked up to look into a pair of eyes watching him- a reptilian pair of eyes. Steve froze as he realised that he was looking into the eyes of a huge snake that was camouflaged in the leaf litter of the forest floor. Neither one of them moved. Steve took in the markings of the snake and recognised it as an anaconda. It may have not been monster movie huge, but it was still frikkin’ enormous.

 

Just as Steve decided to edge away from the creature’s resting place, the anaconda launched itself at him. Its body had been coiled up and whipped forward like a spring. The anaconda aimed its open maw at Steve and caught his left arm. Steve knew they weren’t venomous, and that anacondas were constrictors, but the bite still hurt like hell. The force of the impact knocked Steve back and he rolled with the snake as it wound its serpentine body around him. Steve barely had time to inhale again before he could feel the snake’s powerful muscles crushing down around him. Instinct took over and Steve struggled against the snake’s clutches. He had held down a helicopter the previous year, so Steve hoped he could fight his way out of this tangle if he tried.

 

Steve and the anaconda wrestled for five minutes before the super-soldier was able to get a grip on the snake’s head. He pulled his unbitten right arm out from the anaconda’s coils and grabbed behind the snake’s jaw and squeezed with all his might. His left arm was bleeding where the snake had sunk its teeth in and Steve hoped that the reptile hadn’t cut any large arteries. The snake seemed resolved to hold on and tightened its body around Steve. It was probably one of the more stupid stunts he’d pulled, but as Steve searched his memory for escape tactics he recollected advice on how to deter a shark momentarily and released his hold on the anaconda’s neck to punch the snake.

Luckily the force of a super-soldier punch worked and the snake loosened its hold for a moment. Steve took advantage of that opportunity and grabbed hold of the snake’s head and yanked it away from his arm before grasping it behind the head with two hands.

 

Steve scrambled to his feet and threw himself and the snake to the ground, aiming the snake’s head at a root. The snake’s body slackened in shock upon impact and Steve slipped out of its grasp as the anaconda quickly righted itself. Steve clawed at the ground and staggered to his feet. He ran, glancing back at the snake, which had recovered and was rushing after him. Steve sped up, and cradled his bleeding arm as he pushed himself to escape the reach of the serpent. Fortunately anacondas were not that fast and they weren’t the type of snake to chase one for too long. It was only a minute later that the snake lowered its upper body and slithered off to other environs. Steve kept running until he had reached the river.

 

Steve knew he couldn’t stay near the water for long, since he was bleeding and there were other anacondas, and jaguars and caimans about. So he whipped his ripped shirt off and cleaned his wound as best as he could before wrapping it using his ragged shirt as a bandage. He looked down at himself and huffed a shaky laugh out. What kind of impression would he make on Natasha when he staggered before her shirtless, sweating and covered in mud with a bandaged up snake bite on his arm. His mouth still had charcoal in it, and Steve hocked up enough phlegm to spit out a great big wad of black spit. He rinsed the rest of his mouth with river water as he prayed that he didn’t catch bilharzia or something. Even though the disease wasn’t prevalent in Bolivia it would be just his luck to drink from the solitary pocket of water in the whole country that was contaminated. Steve wondered if they had ever tested him for immunity against the disease.

 

Steve mused that it would probably also just be his luck to reach the logging company’s illegal site after all his trials and find that Natasha had already returned to the environmental activists with all the evidence they needed. It was with thoughts like these that Steve trudged up another hill. His boot got stuck in a puddle of mud and Steve had to pause to yank it out when a blast echoed through the forest. Animals cried out and birds flew away from the noise which came from over the hill. Steve slipped and fell into the mud again, but the movement dislodged his foot so he was able to roll into a crouch. He stood up searching the horizon. That kind of blast was the kind made by dynamite, and there were the ruthless kind of people employed by the logging company about. He could hear muffled shouts and Steve prepared to face off against any attacker who came in his direction.

 

Steve nearly fell on his butt again when the first person that he spotted coming over the hill was the blonde- who was really a redhead- that he’d been searching for. Natasha Romanov skidded down the embankment, efficiently swinging a path through the trees as she hurried away from the noisy happenings on the other side of the hill. She lurched to a halt forty feet away from him when she spotted him.

 

“Steve!” Natasha gasped.

 

“Hi-iiiieeeee,” was all that Steve could muster up in response. He realised belatedly that the grin that accompanied his greeting was probably outlined in black. But that didn’t seem to matter to Natasha as she hurtled towards him and jumped into his arms.

 

“What are you doing here?” Natasha hissed at him between tight hugs. “What happened to you?”

 

“A waterfall and an anaconda,” Steve answered as he shook himself out of the stupor that having her wrapped around his bare chest had thrown him into. “Um, what about the loggers? I presume that’s where you’re coming from.”

 

“Yeah,” Natasha confirmed as she eyed him suspiciously. She slid down his body and regained her feet. Natasha pulled on Steve’s right arm and took his hand as she continued to run down the hill.

 

“I ran into Benicio,” Steve explained and Natasha nodded as she navigated through the verdure ahead of him. “They explained what you were doing here.”

 

“Faster Steve,” Natasha prompted. “We can chat once we’re out of their search range.”

 

Steve pumped his muscles to keep up with Natasha and the pair tore away from the furious loggers, leaving them far behind.  Steve only had to divert the pair’s path once to avoid the area where he’d encountered the giant anaconda. But after half an hour of running through the jungle at serum-enhanced speed the pair was able to slow down and come to a halt.

 

“How’d you find me?” Natasha panted.

 

“I have friends in intelligence,” Steve wheezed.

 

“Was it Clint? I’ll kick his ass,” Natasha grumbled. She flicked her blonde hair over her shoulder and rummaged in her pockets for a hair tie. She came up empty and had to resort to tying her hair in a knot.

 

“No, though I may have overheard some part of a conversation I wasn’t supposed to hear,” Steve confessed.

 

“What happened to your arm? You’re bleeding- or were bleeding,” Natasha asked as she stepped closer and took Steve’s left bicep in her hands to examine what was under the bandage.

 

“I got bitten by an anaconda,” Steve laughed sheepishly. Natasha blinked at him in disbelief. “I sort of had to wrestle it to get away.”

 

“You know the guys we know will have jokes for aeons about that,” Natasha smirked. “Are you hurt anywhere else? Not that I’m not glad to see you, but what are you doing here, Steve?”

 

“Um,” Steve struggled. Words fled from his mind as blood rushed to his cheeks.

 

“Is the team in trouble?” Natasha asked, concern filling her eyes. “Have you guys been made?”

 

“No,” Steve gushed. “No, it’s nothing like that.”

 

“Well then what is it?” Natasha probed. She reached her hand up to touch over his heart as she held his gaze.

 

“I- I- I,” Steve stammered. “I… just wanted to see you.”

 

Natasha stared at Steve and slowly her green eyes widened. That was the most friend-zone-liest answer that could have come out of Steve’s mouth. It was a ridiculously lame response and Steve couldn’t believe that he’d blanked out and ruined his chances again. Steve grimaced in preparation for the chewing out he was about to receive on his irresponsible behaviour. He’d left safe refuge and followed her into a jungle that he knew very little about. He’d also shown her picture to a heck of a lot of people. As usual, his floundering actions had tugged her into the quicksand with him.

 

Steve parted his lips to inhale the breath that would sustain the first sentence of his apology and was knocked back by Natasha crashing her mouth to his. His eyes shot open and he immediately deduced that he must be suffering from some sort of snakebite-induced infection that was making him hallucinate. Only, Natasha’s mouth was still on his after he pinched himself over his throbbing wound. And her arms were around his neck. And her soft curvy body was pressed up against his bare chest. And her tongue was slipping into his mouth.

 

“Fucking hell, Steve, blegh! What did you eat?!” Natasha yelped as she pulled away and spat into shrubs next to them.

 

“Sorry, I ate a lizard and I tried to get rid of the taste by cleaning my teeth with charcoal,” Steve apologised.

 

“A lizard?! Dammit, Steve! Why would you-”

 

“I was hungry!” Steve yelled.

 

“Come here you big lug,” Natasha growled. “I still want to kiss you. I know you’re with Sharon, but dammit, when you pitch up like this in the middle of the jungle just because you want to see me- Steve, I can’t sit back. I have to fight for you.”

 

Natasha pulled Steve down to her lips by the nape of his neck and resumed kissing the daylights out of him. Steve was thoroughly astonished by her words. Natasha thought that he was still with Sharon- even though they were never really together- and Natasha wanted to fight for him. It also seemed that Natasha was willing to use every tool in her arsenal because her hands were travelling down his abdominals and reaching into the waistband of his trousers.

 

“Wait, you want to kiss me?” Steve asked stupidly.

 

“Yeah, why would I be kissing you otherwise, Steven?” Natasha retorted sardonically. Her hand slipped deeper into Steve’s trousers and he jumped in surprise. “I want to kiss you and more. I’m going to persuade you that I’m the better pick. I’m going to show you that you only need me, that you only want me, like I only want you.”

 

Steve giggled incredulously as he tried to step away unsuccessfully from the very pleasant attentions of Natasha’s hand. He grabbed a hold of her shoulders and forced her to face him.

 

“What about- I thought you were with Bruce,” Steve panted.

 

“Bruce and I have been over for a very long time,” Natasha answered in a small voice. “And then I was stuck working everyday with the man I had a crush on for ages but who didn’t notice me. And now he’s here right in front of me.”     

 

“You have a- you like- You like me?” Steve tried to clarify.

 

“I more than like you, Steve. I feel things for you that stamp me 'compromised' in the worst way. I missed you so much, but I knew that you were with Sharon and I- I’d be bad news to be around if I was in the proximity of that unfolding. I’m a dab hand at sabotage and assassination, y’know,” Natasha chuckled bitterly.

 

“Sharon and I are not together, Natasha. I’m in love with you. I’ve been interested in you since the Chitauri invasion. I’ve been in love with you since we hid out at Sam’s in Washington all those years ago,” Steve gushed.

 

“Are you lying?” Natasha asked doubtfully.

 

“No,” Steve promised vehemently. Natasha’s response was to slap him.

 

“Why the hell didn’t you make any moves on me? Why didn’t you even check me out?” Natasha reprimanded him.

 

“Oh, I checked you out,” Steve blurted. Natasha squinted at him and arched an eyebrow enquiringly.

 

“I made use of reflective surfaces in the surrounding area,” Steve clarified.

 

“It’s really adorable that you used one of the techniques I taught you to spy with to ogle me,” Natasha laughed. “Or, at least, I’ve decided that it is.”

 

“You were with someone else, and I was trying not to be a scumbag perving over you,” Steve tried to explain. “Besides, you were a friend.”

 

“Why was I just a friend, Steve?” Natasha asked earnestly. “You’re the one who said you wanted a friend. It gave me a direction on how to act, but… it’s difficult for me to be who I want to be most of the time of my own accord.”

 

“You looked like you needed a friend, Natasha,” Steve admitted. “And I wanted to be what you needed.”

 

“You’re making butterfly things happen in my stomach,” Natasha growled. “You’re an amazing man, Steve. But I’m done with dawdling along on the romance front.”

 

“Huh?” Steve exclaimed. His stomach dropped suddenly and he wondered where he had gone wrong in their exchange for her to suddenly back out.

 

“Damn, when you need a Quinjet they’re never around,” Natasha grumbled.

 

“Er, why do we need a Quinjet? Are you hurt?” Steve asked with growing panic.

 

“Well, I need to get to a hotel room with a bed that I can tie you to so I can have my wicked way with you as soon as possible, Rogers,” Natasha grinned. Steve gulped partly in relief and partly in terror. “Y’know, just thinking about you when I touch myself isn’t enough anymore. Hasn’t been for months now.”

 

“Uummmm,” Steve stalled. His entire vocabulary had abandoned him once again.

 

“I don’t really care that your mouth tastes like a lizard that rolled around in soot and then rolled around in mud, Steve. I’ve lived a life where I’ve learned that what I love can be lost the next day. I want you right now,” Natasha purred as her hand slipped back into Steve’s trousers while the other worked at his button and zipper.

 

“I want you too,” Steve sighed, giving in to her touch as he ran his one hand down her side and fumbled for the nearest tree with the other. “Let’s just watch out for anacondas… and jaguars.”

 

“What the fuck is this in your pocket?” Natasha shrieked as she pulled a small coil of something wet from his pants. “Ew!”

 

She chucked the half a lizard that Steve had saved away from them and wiped her hand on his trousers. She looked back up into his blue eyes and burst into snickers.

 

“Where’re your condoms, soldier?” Natasha asked once her fit of giggles had subsided. She kissed his sternum and licked over the sweaty skin of his pectoral to suck on his nipple.

 

Steve’s eyes widened. “Fuck! They better not have fallen out when I went over the falls.”

 

Steve frantically searched his pockets and was about to scream in frustration when a condom packet was shoved into his face.

 

“Right kind and size?” Natasha asked with a smirk. Steve nodded with a frown and a blush. “Don’t get jealous over why I have one. I was scheduled to head for Wakanda to steal your affections after I finished up here.”

 

“Oh, did you get the evidence?” Steve asked brightly.

 

“Yes, and I blew up some of their equipment so they won’t be able to run their operations for a few days. Focus, soldier,” Natasha commanded as she ripped the foil packet between her teeth carefully and freed him from the stretched-tight confines of his briefs. She placed the condom on her lips and dropped to her knees.

 

“Nat, you don’t have to… haaaaaAAAH!” Steve exclaimed as she rolled the condom on with her delightfully hot mouth.

 

“I need a shower,” Steve babbled in protest as Natasha popped back up.

 

“So do I,” Natasha replied breezily. “We can take one together when we get back into town.” She whipped her white top off to reveal she wore nothing underneath and Steve whimpered as he took the sight in. Natasha made short work of her trousers and pulled them down before she spun around to wiggle her derriere at Steve.

 

“Come on, Steven, I’m waiting. Touch me, fuck me already,” Natasha instructed and arched her back enticingly.

 

“Make love,” Steve corrected weakly. Natasha twisted to face him over her shoulder and smiled warmly at him. She reached up to the hesitant man and caressed down his jaw. She tilted her face up to his to silently ask for a kiss and he obliged.

 

“Always,” Natasha replied gently. “But hard and fast now. We can take our time when we get back to civilization. Please tell me you have a nice hotel room.”

 

“I have a really nice hotel room,” Steve assured her as she nudged against his erection. Steve rubbed himself with increasing confidence against her warm pert curves, relishing in the smooth soft texture of her skin before giving in to the magnetic draw of the heat centred between her legs.

 

“Steve, I want you,” Natasha whispered. “I’ve wanted you for so long. Please, take me.”

 

Natasha guided Steve’s right hand to play with her breasts while he braced them against a tree with his left forearm. The dull throb of his snakebite was forgotten in the face of impending pleasure. Natasha’s hips rocked, teasing his hard length. He twitched against her, buried his head in her silky soft hair that had fallen loose from its knot and Steve luxuriated in the feel of Natasha’s body against his. Over her shoulder Steve peered down her curves to see that Natasha had dipped a hand into her folds and was stroking herself. He groaned and slid his hand down to grasp hold of her hip.

 

“Are you ready?” Steve enquired.

 

“No, I’m not ready. I’m just standing in the middle of the Amazon with my pants half way down and my pussy dripping for the cock pressed up against me,” Natasha teased sarcastically. She reached her wet fingertips up to caress over Steve’s lips and he licked them, savouring the taste of her which was much better than lizard.

 

“Shut up,” Steve half growled, half laughed. “The mouth on you, Romanov…”

 

“Oh please, you know you like sassy women who make excellent use of their mouths- aaaUngh!” Natasha retorted before she was impaled by the thickness of Steve’s erection. She squirmed around a little bit as they both adjusted to the interlocking of their bodies. Natasha’s left arm joined Steve’s in bracing against the tree and her right hand returned to play with her folds and tease his scrotum.

 

“Natasha!” Steve chided.

 

“Move then, soldier,” Natasha whined.

 

Steve did as he was commanded and thrust into Natasha with quick deep strokes. He hadn’t expected the slickness he encountered at such short notice, but was glad of it. The heat of their joining was like a salve for his soul, healing all the ache of the yearning he had endured. Steve changed his stroke to dip into her fast and pull out slow and Natasha moaned in appreciation. His hand wandered from her hip back up to her breasts to knead their fullness and play with her nipples. Steve wanted to get closer than he was, and although he knew it was irrational he endeavoured to. He curled himself over her body and kept his cock as deep as he could get within her and narrowed the run of his thrusts so that his hips only rolled incrementally. Natasha mewled out and began to rub at her clitoris hard.

 

“Steve! That’s just the right angl- aaahhh!” Natasha keened before she quivered and bucked against him. More wetness eased the connection between them and Steve doubled the power of his efforts. Natasha reached back to grab a fistful of his hair and wailed as he pounded into her. He could feel his release beckoning to him and in a few thrusts he achieved it. Natasha was still humping herself on him as he came down from his high, and Steve reached down between her folds to help her along with a slap and a pinch. Natasha’s fingers raked down Steve’s face and she groaned her pleasure out loud.

 

The couple stood leaning against the tree, absorbing their actions and getting a grasp on reality again. Steve inhaled the scent of Natasha. He was definitely addicted to her smell. He was addicted to her everything.

 

“Nat, I kind of completely love you,” Steve murmured, repeating his earlier confession.

 

Natasha chuckled. “I… love you, Steve. It feels good to say that. I also want to more of what we just did, but indoors where monkeys won’t stare at us.”

 

Steve glanced up and finally noticed their curious audience.

 

“Real Garden of Eden vibe here,” Natasha chortled.

 

“Don’t worry, Roman Ogers has a room waiting,” Steve assured her.

 

“Roman Ogers?” Natasha queried as she twisted in his arms before breaking into a grin. “Your cover is our couple name?”

 

“Yeah, thankfully you ship us or this would be really embarrassing,” Steve replied before leaning in for another tender kiss.  

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Felix Felicis is the Liquid Luck potion from the Harry Potter series that makes things work out in your favour for the period that the potion is effective.
> 
> The surname ‘Ogers’ is real, although you’ll have to assure Google that you really do mean ‘Ogers’ and not ‘Rogers’. Also, if there is a dude somewhere called ‘Roman Ogers’, he probably hates us because if you type his name into a search engine all you get is our ship’s stuff. Poor possibly existing Roman Ogers ;)


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